For anyone that isn’t aware I created and maintain maps for the different central Florida Theme Parks including Disney and all the resorts. This was something I always wished was available years ago when I used to visit the parks every few years to help expedite my collecting. I’ve received many comments of gratitude for having these available and you can find them here for your own travels. But to ensure these are as up to date as possible I do make frequent trips to all the parks and resorts. This was the case on a recent trip over to Disney’s Art of Animation resort.
A couple weeks ago I visited the machine in the Landscape of Flavor food court that was home to one of the 2021 dated designs.
During this visit a few weeks ago I noticed the machine was missing (image above right). My assumption was that this machine had been removed temporarily so it could receive the new updated payment system we have seen many times in the past. The cost would be $1, and the machine would now supply the penny. I had no reason to think this machine wasn’t coming back especially since it has one of the 2021 dated designs and as of the printing of this article it’s only August so lots more time before the end of the year.
That is why on this quick visit I was completely shocked to see something different in this space. It was a nice surprise but also a bit confusing at the same time.
The new machine is one of the newer 8-design versions that has quickly become very popular at the Disney parks and resorts. It’s hard to tell in the above picture but this machine is quite a bit shorter than the other standard models. I assume this is just due to the recessed area it was being installed in. The machine has all the new payment system upgrades, and also some new designs.
A couple of the designs are the same as before, and also include a few from the second machine located not to far away in this very same food court. Due to this I’m assuming that second machine will be removed very soon. On this most recent visit it was still there and unchanged. But having duplicate designs seems odd and I will be surprised if that machine doesn’t disappear in the near future. Hopefully it will come back with other new designs, but now that they have this 8-design model here they may opt to just have the one machine. I’ll be checking back to see what happens here.
I always enjoy a nice surprise new penny machine, but this was definitely not on my radar of possibilities. With that 2021 dated design now missing I’m thinking we will see it back soon in a different machine. Possibly that second machine still here in the food court, or like they did with the Spaceship Earth 2021 design in Epcot it may get moved to a completely new location. This is what’s fun and at times a bit frustrating for collectors when designs are moved around out of the blue. I’ll make it my mission to continue following up on these changes and if I find out where that 2021 design goes you will be the first to know. Be sure to check out our maps for your future Disney, Universal, Sea World or Busch Gardens visits, I’m a bit biased but I think they will definitely help on your squishin’ missions.
Have a wonderful week and always remember to Keep on Pressing!
Recently I was visiting the Universal Orlando theme parks just checking on all the penny machines to ensure our park penny maps were up to date. In case you are unaware we maintain maps for most of the Central Florida parks to help collectors with their collections. These are completely free and you can find them here. During this visit I headed back over towards the Velocicoaster attraction to check out the gift shop inside the Discovery Center building.
My curiosity on new merchandise has got the best of me so I headed inside, but instead of new merch something else immediately caught my eye.
As you can see from the picture above the cabinet had a pretty cool looking wrap design making it look like it was carved out of stone and had some Dino foot prints going up the side.
Excited for a brand new set of pressed pennies I headed over for a closer look but when I saw the designed they looked very familiar.
The design in the middle is the same as the one we found initially celebrating the Grand Opening of the Velocicoaster attraction.
I’ve compared them myself and they appear to be identical. I’m kind of surprised they would release two of the same design but this location seems much more appropriate for this penny. It’s so much closer to the actual attraction and most guests will walk right pass this machine as they exit the ride..
The other two designs including the Jurassic World logo and Raptor coins I knew I had seen them somewhere else in property. I took to my online collection and sure enough found that they were available inside the Jurassic Outfitters Gift Shop. The machine is all the way in the back of the store near the exit to the Jurassic Park River Adventure ride. You’ll know you are in the right spot as there will be a bunch of soaking wet people exiting the ride. Above is a picture of that machine and you can see those same two designs.
As much as I was excited to find this machine it was a little disappointing that the penny designs are duplicates and available in other areas of the park. Maybe this means that these duplication ones will be replaced with other new designs in the future. Only time will tell and I’ll be sure to check back on them. Plus since the Grand Opening designs are date as 2021 I would think these also have a limited shelf life before they are replaced.
Have a fantastic week and as always Keep on Pressing!
What to see more details on all the work that went into creating this pressed penny, check out our Youtube Video here.
Way back on March 18th, 2014 I created this blog and made my first post about a visit to the Great Wolf Lodge in the Pennsylvania Pocono Mountains. I had recently gotten back into the hobby of collecting elongated coins shortly before that and when searching online for stories or information on pressed pennies there really wasn’t much out there. I had found the TEC club and joins, but with newsletters released quarterly that left quite a bit of time in-between issues where I was looking for more stories. So I thought I would go ahead and start documenting my trips in case anyone out there was in a similar situation. When I first was trying to design the blog I didn’t have money to pay an artist or graphic designer so instead I took it upon myself to try and create it from scratch.
I sat at my office desk in the basement of our house trying to come up with an idea and thought about just laying some elongated coins on the desk. Disney is always very popular so I thought by using some Disney coins it would help grab readers attention, plus I figured why not include some TEC coins in case any club members stopped by. Then once I took the picture I though it looked pretty good, and added the black box in the middle to try and help make the text stand out a bit. Boom, there was my first banner for the blog and then in August 2017 when I launched our YouTube channel this same banner was used there as well.
It’s done us well for all these years, but earlier this year I had finally decided that it was time to rebrand a bit. I’ve shared hundreds of stories, shown off thousands of coins, chatted with so many of you fellow collectors and just felt we needed to come up with something new. Now I promise our blog and videos will continue to focus on pressed coins, that will absolutely not change. Below I’m going to review with you the entire process of working on a new official logo and a very special custom pressed penny.
First I needed to work on a new logo. I had tried to make something myself a few times but as I mentioned at the beginning that is just not something I’m good at. I’ll save myself the embarrassment of my designs, and instead will go right to the ones that I had hired professionals to create.
To try and do this on a very reasonable budget I thought I would try using the service Fiverr.com. I’ve heard both good and back experience but it seems that’s pretty common place for online services anywhere. After this entire process I can say that everyone I worked with was very professional and I didn’t have any issues. Above was the first logo design I received back, this was after a few revision requests. Initially the design was a circle and in a more silver color. I asked for it to be elongated so it looked more like a pressed coin and changed the color to a gold/bronze color to try and mimic a penny. This was not a bad initial design, but I wanted to see what else other designers could come up with.
The second logo design I received is pictures above. Similar to the first design I asked for a few revisions and this was the final product. I liked the circle and ring portion of the logo as being a bit unique, but then with the standard text below I felt it would be difficult to implement this eventually into a coin design.
Thirds times the charm. I was open to trying more and more until I found something that just grabbed me, but thankfully that happened with the third logo. I liked that it portrayed a pressed coins, also had the familiar dots within the logo that usually we are used to seeing around the board of our pressed pennies. This just immediately jumped out as the one I liked the best. If you follow me on Instagram you may have already seen this as my profile picture. I was so excited to get it that I immediately put on there as my new profile picture. It’s hard to remember all the different places that this logo will need to be updated without our community, but I’ll be working on that over the next few weeks. But before I get to that I was excited to get into the process of creating our own pressed coin design.
I took quite a bit of time chatting with some pressed coin designers, and also chatted with friends in our community that have had their own coins created to try and get some recommendations. That did help narrow my list down quite a bit and then I took more time to review the other designs they each have created to see what grabbed my attention. After all of that I chose to work with Paul Connor at Paul Conner Studios and I’ve included a link to his website in case you would like to see his other work. After a quick email over to Paul with a copy of my brand new logo I basically gave him carte blanche to come up with some ideas. To my surprise Paul got back to me within an hour or so with the above three initial designs. Just like with the new logo, when I saw these options one immediately jumped out at me. But I wanted to get some additional feedback so I showed some friends and family to see what they liked and it was almost unanimous.
I sent Paul an email confirming the design we wanted to proceed with, and placed the order. It took a few weeks for him to get the die created and then the coins pressed.
Waiting for the package of coins to arrive in the mail seemed like forever, but in reality I think it was only a couple of days. When it arrived I dropped what I was doing to tear into the box and see it in all it’s bright shiny glory, and I absolutely love it.
Now for the exciting part. This new logo and special pressed penny is all because of you. Without all your support and kind comments I wouldn’t have been able to do this. I have chatted with so many of you over the years about your own collections and am so happy to be able to share this penny with you my penny pals.
The penny is completely free if you would like one for your very own collection. I’ll just ask that you cover the postage cost to get it back to your home. So all you need to do is send me a Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope to our new P.O. Box address listed below. Once I receive it I’ll put your penny in the envelope and shipped back to you as soon as possible.
Then if you want to share pictures on Instagram, Twitter or Facebook of your new penny be sure to tag us so we can share it with everyone. Also, I have had some penny pals ask if they can send me mail and with this new P.O. Box you can absolutely do so. I would love to hear from all of you, and just let me know if it’s okay to share your letters with everyone and I’ll create a special section on our blog where we can see all the letters or postcards that come in. It will be so much fun to see where everyone is from, and maybe include some pictures of your own collections.
I do want to say once again from the bottom of my heart that this is all because of your wonderful support that I’m able to make these improvements to the blog and our community. Hopefully this is the first of many special pressed coin designs we can release. Have a wonderful week and as always Keep on Pressing!
On a recent visit to Universal Orlando Resort, I was just checking in on all the machines to see if anything had changed or if any where missing. Plus I had received a tip about a possible new machine at one of the attractions.
For most of my trip around the park everything appears normal and as it had been on previous visit. Then I entered the San Francisco area of the park and decided to jump on a ride that has become almost a joke within the park. It replaced a guest favorite attraction called Disaster and there were high hopes for this new attraction based on the movie fanchise it was to be based on.
Fast & Furious Supercharged is not one of my favorite attractions, but it does have a few things going for it. The queue is almost entirely inside with plenty of nice crisp air conditioning.
While you are waiting in the queue which usually is not very long (another plus) has plenty of interesting props from the Fast and Furious movie franchise including plenty of cars.
Eventually you get to the actual attraction where you start out by boarding a large “party bus”. Then things get a bit disappointing. Basically your bus drives into a large room where it is surrounded by a large movie screen dome that completely surrounds your vehicle. This is to try and give the illusion that you are in the middle of the movie. But the effects are pretty bad, the story is strange and I know that the F&F movies are a bit out there when it comes to the stunts but it’s taken to a whole new level of weird in this one. After a few minutes of the attraction your party bus heads back into the loading station where you exit and then walk into a themed gift shop. Unfortunately Universal doesn’t allow any video or photos to be taken on their attractions including this one, but if you want to see more of it I’m sure you can google a few secretly filmed videos on Youtube.
The gift shop is called Custom Gear and you can access it without having to endure this attraction. Just outside the store are a few more cars on display and is also where I found the new pressed penny machine.
The design of the machine cabinet is pretty cool. I like the diamond plate trim around the edge kind of like a large mechanic’s toolbox. The red and black colors are pretty inline with the Fast and Furious franchise colors. You may also notice that this machine was released at the now standard $1 price point, and the machine will supply the penny to be pressed. You no long need to bring your own pennies.
The set of designs includes images of the Fast & Furious Supercharged logo, the F&F Family Forever shield logo, F&F Lightning Bolt and Wrench log, and lastly a cool looking exotic car.
So first off lets just revisit the attraction for a moment. I have plenty of friends ask if they should ride it and I always say they should at least ride once and make their own decision. I don’t completely hate it, as I mentioned it’s a nice way to get a break from the hot Florida sun. The movie you experience is pretty far fetched but to be honest that pretty much the same as the Fast & Furious movies. If you like the movies I’m sure you will enjoy this ride at least a little bit. Some friends I know do get a bit of motion sickness from the attraction since your “party bus” is sitting still, but the movie around you makes it seem like you are moving so your equilibrium can be thrown off a bit. If you are subject to this from time to time you may want to just skip the ride.
Now for those new pressed pennies. I do think this is a great new set and I’m happy that we finally got some for this attraction. It opened quite a few years ago and I was surprised back then when no new machine was released but this situation seems to be pretty common for Universal. Look how long it took for us to finally get some Harry Potter pressed coins. Better late than never I always say.
Have a fantastic week and be sure to visit back with us again soon. Thanks for visiting and as always make sure to Keep on Pressing!
I will start out by saying that I am by no means a Nascar expert, but I’ve always enjoyed cars in general. I’ve never been to a Nascar race in person but have watched a few races on television. It’s hard to comprehend exactly how fast they are going around that track, and the knowledge that any little error can cause a major wreck just gives me so much respect for the drivers in those vehicles.
For even casual or non-racing fans I think everyone is aware of the Daytona 500. Living in Orlando I’m not too far way from the Daytona International Speedway but have never made the trip over until just recently. A friend of mine was interested in visiting the Buc-ee’s in Daytona Beach that I wrote about here. After that visit I’m always looking for an excuse to head back out for some Beaver Nuggets so we hit the road bright and early. Then after filling up on Buc-ee’s products we still had the whole day ahead of us with nothing planned so I thought it may be a great opportunity to visit the speedway.
It was pretty easy to find and after parking in the visitors lot we walked along the outside of the Speedway and I was completely taken back by how huge it was. There were no races going on so most of it was deserted outside, but we could hear the familiar sounds of cars flying around the track which I think was part of a tour you could take.
Even though there was no race going on during our visit, there is still some areas of the speedway property that we were able to explore.
Inside was an information area, as well as a fun gift shop which we will get to shortly, but where we spent most of our time was in the Motorsports Hall of Fame and museum. It was incredible.
This was a self guided tour, but they had people around to answer questions if you had any. One thing they were sure to let us know was that the museum wasn’t just about Nascar but all Motorsports. We definitely saw that inside with all different types of vehicles and other race vehicles throughout. I even found this cool Fabulous Hudson Hornet car from one of my favorite Pixar animated movies Cars.
One area of the museum that was really cool is where they have the current Daytona 500 Champion car. There is a whole section with pictures of the winning driver, the humongous trophy and the actual car. One of the guides told us that after the race this car is literally just driven off the track and right into this spot.
They even told us to go around the back of the car and look on the opposite side where there is quite a bit of damage from early in the race when the car got a bit too close to the wall.
After we finished with the museum it was time to head into the gift shop. As with many of the other places we visit they had an amazing assortment of items for sale. Plenty of t-shirts, but even die-cast models, seat covers, posters, artwork and so much more.
Out of the back of the gift shop is a little cafe where you can get some drinks and snacks. This is also where I found a pressed penny machine.
The machine cabinet was fun with the checkered pattern along the sides. It was a classic 3-design electric model so it saved my arms from having to crank our my pennies manually.
The designs on the pennies were really great as well. They include the Daytona International Speedway Logo, The Coke 200 Logo, and of course the Daytona 500 Logo. Special thanks to Summers Raceway for supplying some of the props I used in the above picture. If you like Hot Wheels racing be sure to head over to their YouTube channel and check out a race.
I really had a great time at the Daytona International Speedway, and am actually very interested in going back to see a race in person. I’m sure it would definitely be a unique experience. Even if you aren’t a Nascar fan I still think the speedway has a lot of fun things to do and explore, plus you’ll need to pickup a set of these cool pressed pennies.
When people think about going on vacation one of the top places that come to mind if Florida, and if you are a theme park junkie Orlando is probably your ideal place to visit. The Orlando International Airport has become one of the busies airports in the country and on any particular day there can be tens of thousands of people coming and going from there. The airport is not huge, but does jam in a lot of different restaurant and of course shopping for those last minute gifts or souvenirs. In the past I’ve posted about some pressed penny machines that used to be available in some of those stores, but over time they have almost all been removed. There is one store that did continue to keep a machine and that was the Disney Earport shop. This store has recently gone through a closure and renovation but is now back open and has a new pressed penny machine.
There can be a bit of confusion in this airport as there are actually two separate Disney stores. Previously they had slightly different names to help distinguish them, but now after the renovations both are called Magic of Disney. One of the stores is near the security check for gates 1 – 59, this is not the store with the penny machine. Instead you need to head over to the opposite side of the terminal towards security area for gates 70-129.
This is the larger of the two Disney stores, and I will admit that this new look is really fantastic. I like the new fixtures and how all the merchandise is now displayed. It seems much more open, even though it’s jam-packed with many of the items you may have missed at the parks.
Since I visit the parks quite often I didn’t spend much time looking at the merch, instead I was on the hunt for the new pressed penny machine and it didn’t take long for it’s beautiful cabinet to catch my eye.
I love these not-so “hidden” Mickeys made out of US cents that completely cover the cabinet. This is such a fun Disney touch and I hope we see things like this on future machines.
Two of penny designs were brought over from that old machine they used to have here and were of Pilot Mickey and Stitch. This new set now also include additional designs of Donald and Goofy, plus four designs from the Disney animated movie Planes which I believe was a spin-off of the Pixar’s Cars movie. I have not see this movie but guess I’ll have to add it to my Disney+ watch list so I can check it out. The designs are of characters named Dusty, Bravo, Echo and Skipper.
I wish that I was actually at the airport heading into the skies for a fun vacation, but at least for awhile long we are staying close to home with a few scheduled staycations coming up. Stay tuned for posts about those adventures soon. The new cabinet on this machine is really amazing and I do think it was cool that they released some designs for this Planes movie that may be a hidden gem. Between these designs and the recently released Robin Hood pennies at Epcot it seems like Disney may be starting to dig into their vault for some unique new pressed pennies.
I am so excited to be able to share this with everyone. Back when I was young we didn’t have many Disney movies on VHS tape, but one of the ones we did own was the 1973 Animated Classic Robin Hood. It has always held a special place in my heart and is truly one of my absolute favorite Disney movies. The music is fantastic, and I know that it was unfortunately released during what some consider the dark days of Disney Animation history, but to me it really is a great movie.
As with many guests visiting Walt Disney World or Disneyland who come across many of the pressed penny machines they want to collect the designs for their favorite attraction, character or even movie. For me however this was a problem since Robin Hood just didn’t have any pressed coin designs available anywhere on property, and trust me I looked exhaustively. As the years past I figured it may be a lost cause as the movie just fell further and further out of date.
Apparently my patience has finally paid off and I was browsing one of my favorite Disney pressed coin resources the presscoins.com website and after over 5 months since Disney has last released any sort of new collectible coin they had announced a brand new machine placed in Epcot and best of all it had designed themed after….wait for it ….. Robin Hood! Bam, finally!!!
This just could not wait any longer. I immediately jumped in my car and drove over to Epcot, weaved my way through the immense crowd that had gathered for the 2021 version of Epcot’s Food and Wine festival. That was tempting as well, but I was on the hunt for these Robin Hood pennies and wanted them before Disney realized they had made a mistake and removed them. As I left Future World and arrived at the World Showcase I turned to the left as if you were heading towards the Mexico Pavilion. Before that there is a fairly large souvenir shop that we have visited on many occasions in the past called Disney Traders.
Inside is your standard Disney gift shop with stuffed animals, t-shirts and so much more. Usually they will also house a lot of the Festival merchandise that take place at different times of the year.
Just to the left side of the store’s check out area is a soda cooler and is also where the new pressed penny machine is located. Previously in this location was a 3-design electronic machine that had some generic Frozen designs of Anna, Elsa and Olaf.
I thought it was interesting to see that this new machine was designed just like that old Frozen machine in a solid blue cabinet. I thought for Robin Hood it may be more of a green color, but trust me I’m not complaining with this sweet new set of designs.
These machine had 8 designs in total including images of Robin Hood, Maid Marion, Robin and Marion Together, Friar Tuck, Little John, Skippy, Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham. I do wish they had included a design of Sir Hiss or Alan-A-Dale the Rooster that sings many of the songs. But that’s okay, maybe we can expect another set of Robin Hood designs with some different characters. Maybe that’s asking too much so I’ll just stick with these for now. Another nice thought is that if this movie can still have pressed coins created for it years after its initial release there are hope for many other animated classics still in Disney’s vault. With Walt Disney World about to start celebrating their 50th anniversary I’m looking forward to seeing if any other classic characters get to make their debut as a pressed coin.
Only a few weeks ago I made the trip up to St. Augustine Florida to visit the very first Buc-ee’s location and I was immediately hooked. In case you haven’t checked out that post you can visit it here. Shortly after that location opened the second Florida store opened in Daytona Beach. Since my first trip I’ve been thinking about those breakfast tacos, and sliced brisket sandwiches. So I had a day off from work and headed for the Atlantic coast to visit my new favorite roadside stop.
As I drove into the parking lot my mouth was already watering and I couldn’t wait to get inside. I did actually need to fill up my car with gas so I decided to do that first and just had to pick out one of their over 100 gas pumps available for travels. Yes I said that correctly, over 100 gas pumps. I don’t think you will ever need to wait for an open pump when visiting these stores.
Since this store had just opened not too long before this visit, they still had their promotional huge Bucky beaver inflated out front greeting guests.
One thing I noticed as I walked inside is the store was almost identical to the St. Augustine store, except that it was flipped in the opposite directly. St. Augustine had the merchandise area on the left of the main entrance, and the food on the right, but here in Daytona it was flipped. Not a big deal but since I was already familiar with the layout from my other trip, it made finding things much easier.
But first things first, I headed over to the penny press machine to ensure I wouldn’t forget to use it. I was so excited for breakfast that I could see myself pigging out and leaving without getting my coveted coins.
The cabinet of the machine was identical to the St. Augustine model, and I’ve checked out online some of the Texas locations and they all seem to be this same design.
I pressed my coins and noticed that they were also exactly the same as the St. Augustine versions except these listed the Daytona Beach location instead. But the rest of the details for each design were the same. Notice the beaver nuggets in the background, yeah I initially picked up just one bag but ran back inside afterwards to pickup another 2 or maybe 6 bags. Who knows when I would be back and these things are very addictive.
One quick side note, on top of the machine was a bin with some Penny Adventure journals available for purchase. In case you haven’t seen these before they are like the penny booklets you find in other locations but so much more than that inside. I already have one of these in my collection at home and posted about it already which you can read about here. Definitely take a look as I think it’s a really cool idea and a nice way to store you collection.
With my new pressed coins stored away I headed back into the food area of the store and just completely went nuts. I couldn’t help myself and ordered enough food for my entire family that should have lasted a few days but I sat in my car and just indulged myself. Feeling a little guilty afterwards I started to make my way back home with my bags of Beaver Nuggets not too far away, you know just in case I needed a snack for the ride home. My family has an upcoming vacation at Daytona Beach so I’ll be making another pit stop here before too long, and be sure to subscribe to our blog so you can check out those future posts. Plenty more pressed penny machines throughout Daytona Beach and I’ll be doing my best to find them all.
Have a fantastic week and be sure to always Keep on Pressing!
Theme Parks around Central Florida have all started their return to an almost pre-pandemic operation. Facial coverings are options for those guests that are fully vaccinated, capacity limits have been removed, and social distancing requirements are also gone. This was a pretty momentous occasion and I wanted to head over to Universal to see how things were going, not just with crowd levels and attraction wait times, but of course I wanted to check on the penny press machines. Would we find any new ones? Unfortunately not, but instead the machines have been converted to the now more common cost of $1 to press. Below I will review each machine, but the designs have not changes, and we’ve previously gone over the new payment system and options so I won’t be doing that again. This will just be a quick trip through Universal’s CityWalk revising all the machines.
This trip will start out by the parking garages and security hub. This area is still available even if you are not parked in this section, but you would need to head towards the Jurassic Park / King Kong / Jaws garage.
Just past the gift shop near security you will find these first two machines. For now these are the only two machines available outside of CityWalk near the parking garages.
Here’s a closer picture of the two machines. Their cabinets are the same, except for the new payment information stickers on them. Both of these machines were located in this same location prior to the change, but there was a third machine here that has been removed. It’s been quite awhile since that machine was removed so I don’t know if it’s still scheduled to come back or maybe it will be moved somewhere else.
Now we are through security and heading into CityWalk. Before we head too far to the right of the Welcome To Universal Orlando sign is the Universal CineMark movie theater.
Out front of the movie theater are two machines. This first machine with the black cabinet used to be on the second level of this area near the food court area. After it’s conversion it has been moved down to this lower level for what I think is a much higher traffic area.
The second machine with the blue cabinet is back in it’s same location from before the change over. Just to make sure I don’t confuse anyone, these machines are located out front of the CineMark movie theater. So you don’t need to go inside to use them. You will actually pass right by these machines as you head towards the theme parks.
As you walk in the general direction towards Islands of Adventure on the left side of the courtyard is a gift shop that has been here for awhile, but it has now been rebranded as the Universal Legacy Store, instead of just the studio store. On the opposite side of the courtyard is a brand new huge Studio Store but no new machines are in there at this time. Hopefully a new one will arrive soon as I’d love to review that new store with all of you.
Inside the Legacy Store there are lots of fun Universal movie props from different movies throughout their history. It’s almost like a museum that also sells Harry Potter merchandise. Near the check out area for the store used to be one of the Harry Potter 8-design machines, but that has been moved over to the new Gift Shop I mentioned above.
Now in this spot they have relocated the 4-design machine that used to be right inside the main doors.
It wouldn’t a trip to CityWalk without stopping for some Voodoo donuts. Did you read all about the National Donut Day pressed penny, if not you can check it out here. But before I grab a pink box of donuts, we headed in-between Voodoo and the NBC Grill & Brew. There is a short hallway that has some exit doors to the Movie Theater, and a set of restrooms.
This is also where the last two pressed penny machines that have been converted can be found. If you don’t know about them you probably wouldn’t ever see them back here. I have spoke to a few other collectors that walked right by this area and didn’t know they were there. It does seem like a strange place to put these, but I know that at night after the parks close Voodoo donuts does encounter a pretty long line that wraps through this area so maybe that’s where these machines get most of their usage.
These aren’t all the machine located in CityWalk, but rather just the versions that have been recently changed. There is a 4-design machine in Bubba Gump Shrimp that is (for now) still just $0.50 per penny. I also mentioned the 8-design Harry Potter machine in the new Universal Studio Store, and one last 8-design machine in the gift shop for Margaritaville. Be sure to check back for updates on Universal’s other machines and they continue to change them.
Universal Studios in Orlando has had the worst kept secret for months. Back in 2019 inside the Islands of Adventure theme park a large area of land was being cleared out around the Jurassic Park Discovery center building. As the months went by, large metal support structures started to go vertical and new building started to take shape. Fans were questioning Universal about what was going on and through the parks social media accounts they joking said it was a new churro stand. Obviously this was a joke but one that to this day they have continued to play on. Soon after however there was a flooding of leaked news online about the new coaster and that it was to be called Velocicoaster.
Even from a distance this new attraction is quite impressive. It’s now listed as the parks Tallest and Fastest roller coaster and is the fastest launched coaster in all of Florida. It features two launches with one reaching 70 mph in 2.4 seconds, on a track of more than 4,700 feet, and a top heigh of 155 feet.
I visited the park a few weeks ago prior to the official opening on June 10th, 2021 and it has a surprised soft opening. Now I’ll say right up front this attraction looks a little too intense for me. So far at the time of posting this I have not ridden this, but I will say I’m definitely intrigued by it so the possibility for a ride in the future may still happen.
Even though on this visit I wasn’t going to ride the coaster, the soft opening did allow me to get up close and personal with this new area of the park. Just out front are some pretty intimidating looking Raptor statues.
There is a big courtyard out from of the main entrance to the coaster, but this filled up quickly as the crowds arrive to jump in line. As I stood in this courtyard the coaster vehicle zooms past at top speed in various different spots and even goes upside down right over the pathway with guests screaming the whole time.
Around the other side of the Discovery Center is the initial section of track for this coaster. It twists and turns in and out of various rock structures and you can hear Raptor’s screeching as they give chase to the coaster.
Inside the Discovery Center is a new gift shop for the Velocicoaster. I headed inside to take a look hoping for a new pressed penny machine. This is actually the same location that I previously found a new Jurassic World machine a couple years prior and you read out it here. Unfortunately there was no new machine here, and to add insult to injury that other machine was also missing. Whenever possible I do try to speak with team members to see if they have any insight. Sometimes they don’t have any info, but on this day I lucked out and a very friendly team member named Jennifer told me that she heard there was a special Velocicoaster penny available. She didn’t know exactly where it was but she thought it was near some restrooms. I thanked Jennifer profusely and with this new lead was off to hunt around. I knew of three different sets of restroom nearby and the first two didn’t pay off. The third was a little bit of a walk from the Velocicoaster, past the River Adventure attraction, and around the corner from the Jurassic Outfitters gift shop.
There is was just down this pathway near the restrooms and water fountain. This did seem like a very strange place to put this machine especially so far away from the new attraction and I would think it would get so much more use if it was closer to the actual ride. My guess is this will be moving at some point in the future but if not you will now be in the know of exactly where to find it.
The machine had a fun cabinet design which I assumed was to try and replicate stone or rock. As you can see it also has the new payment system available and each design costs $1 plus the machine will supply the penny to be pressed.
Now there are a few interesting things to note about these designs. First off, the first and third designs are the same ones that were in that machine I had found inside the Discovery Center (mentioned earlier in this post) that on this visit had been missing. Well I guess I found out what happened to it. So those two designs were the same as before, but the second or middle design was brand new and absolutely georgous.
That new design has the Velocicoaster logo on it, some of the track and of course a ferocious raptor. It also says Grand Opening 2021 which I just love. My assumption is this design will be available during this inaugural year of operation and will eventually be retired. But we have seen other dated coins kept around many months after that year has come and gone so I would recommend getting this coin as soon as you can. Otherwise you may lose out.
Oh one other oddity with these designs is that if you compare the pennies I received from the machine with the marquee picture above one of the images is different. On the marquee design #3 looks like a Triceratops skull / head, but in the pennies I received this design didn’t come out. Instead another design was pressed. I’m not sure if the die is incorrect or if the marquee is wrong. I don’t even know if Universal or the vendor that maintains the machines knows this happened. I’ll keep an eye on it during future visits to see if this changes, but wanted to let you know in case you went to press your own set.
Well it wasn’t a churro cart, and even though I haven’t gotten up the nerve to ride this yet I think this was a better attraction for this park. The reviews from fellow guests have been incredible and the wait times have been pretty crazy so I think they have a hit on their hands. This new “limited” pressed penny is just so incredible I hope we see more like this in the future celebrating new attractions. Geez all this talk of churros I feel like I need a snack, now if only I can find an actual churro stand nearby.
David's Coin Travels 